As proprietors of the soc, the lords claimed a great number of fees and perquisites, payable by all classes of people, whether free or servile, who negotiated any affairs within the soc, and which no doubt formed in themselves a considerable source of revenue.
[…] there are several examples of forced veilings of noblewomen and queens from the early Middle Ages.
A world-class pussy bandit, Micah had experienced marriage as a seven-year montage of chorus singers and starlets, secretaries and schoolteachers, cigarette girls and cocktail waitresses, all of them happily hopping into his lap, a pinwheeling collage of legs waving from taxicab windows, lewd acts performed in commissary bathrooms and the back of darkened screening rooms, the entire apparatus of moviemaking at times seeming less about money and craftsmanship than a riot of unrestrained coupling.
Not only is it now acceptable to be curious — and this book is largely about how that came to be the case — but it is easier than ever, because of the knee-trembling quantity of information we have at our fingertips.
